from Song of Myself, Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman

I celebrate myself;
And what I assume you shall assume;
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

I loafe and invite my soul;
I lean and loafe at my ease . . . . observing a spear of summer grass.

Houses and rooms are full of perfumes . . . . the shelves are crowded with
      perfumes;
I breathe the fragrance myself, and know it and like it,
The distillation would intoxicate me also, but I shall not let it.

The atmosphere is not a perfume . . . . it has no taste of the distillation . . . . it is
      odorless,
It is for my mouth forever . . . . I am in love with it,
I will go to the bank by the wood and become undisguised and naked,
I am mad for it to be in contact with me.

The smoke of my own breath,
Echoes, ripples, buzzed whispers . . . . loveroot, silkthread, crotch and vine;
My respiration and inspiration . . . . the beating of my heart . . . the passing of
      blood and air through my lungs,
The sniff of green leaves and dry leaves, and of the shore, and dark-colored sea-
     rocks, and of hay in the barn,
The sound of the belch'd words of my voice . . . . words loosed to the eddies of
     the wind,
A few light kisses . . . . a few embraces . . . . a reaching around of arms,
The play of shine and shade on the trees as the supple boughs wag,
The delight alone or in the rush of the streets, or along the fields and hillsides,
The feeling of health . . . . the full-noon trill . . . the song of me rising from bed
     and meeting the sun.

Song of Us

Naked birch, spruce and cottonwood
felled across a midnight sky-lake, stared, gazed
through a band of star light. I swayed
limbs shivering, and wondered if the trees knew
whose breath held up the mountains.

I marveled that they did not seem afraid, let
my breath expire into a brown foothill, rush
across the Tannana Valley, surround the sky-lake trees
whisper under roots. And they inspired me
as if I were an animating source and they a vital principle

hushing us, gazing bands of star light, us

wavering particles shifting into body worlds, us

galaxies in generations of galaxies, us

star sounds set to animal poems, us

planet songs set to suns, us

minds to moon swelling, us

wagging as the supple boughs wag . . .
endlessly rewriting.

Calaya J Williams © 2000

This atmosphere is not a perfume

this atmosphere is not a perfume
but the presence that remains
in contours pressed when you rose to leave
with morning

i am embracing the slow escape of warmth
to find comfort in this chilling room
shaping your image in
the smoke of my own breath
and half day-dreaming

what i can't do is hold you
grasp as i might to catch the illusion
there is nothing but a trace
left in a warm fold of sheet
that suggests the smell of you
and it is my skin that lies alone
bare against the sheets
and last desire

FFF Faust © 2000

These rooms are full of perfumes

none of them mine: the light green soap
in the dish: the heavy pine
of the lavatory cleaner; something warm
left in the folds of the velvet curtains.

"It's not easy", her daughter said,
the week before we moved, "starting over".
So she left us carpet, curtains,
the dead woman's furniture,

down to clean towels, tissue
on the roll. Its hard not to see knotted hands
reaching, suds on a loose belly, fabric
roughing her papery thighs.

We brought our own mattress, but sleep
on her bed, face her way, towards curtains
that don't close; are woken by the edge of light
that touched her each morning, but the last.

I cut crimson roses from her garden,
vase them on her dresser. They drowse me
on these unripe mornings, as I plan a nursery,
for the child I fear will never be conceived.

Helen Clare © 2000

The full noon trilll

Among the thrills and spills of meaning that came from you
I think of blueberries and guns speaking without wanting answers
at the high noon of day
when nobody is fooled by shadows.

I wonder this because, like you, I can,
like the bird high above me
cruising the wind and know its not going
anywhere in particular and only inhabits the air
in defiance of gravity just because it can, stays
up there, just after noon today, as a form of defence.

Here by the chair where I sit is a table
still soaked in rainwater globules. A wasp has landed
as the world moves round the sun which emerges
from a cloud and the wasp, for the moment, is floodlit
as it sticks in a drop of water, flutters and buzzes
its annoyance and distress while I look on not willing
to risk the sting.

I see the tiny drama end as the sun again slips behind a cloud
and the high flying bird is swallowed too as the wasp
cuts loose and takes itself wearily away.

Walt, it is a wonderful place today -
it is barely a minute after noon and already the trill has been sharp,
the world has dramatically changed
for one of its creatures has averted tragedy.

I wonder if you knew that you had already passed the full-noon trill,
had already moved into the afternoon.
I think not, just as I merely dwell on the question at a garden table
as the sun continues to shine
and me and the clouds continue our movement.

The wasp has now long gone and the bird never reappeared.

James Bell © 2000

There I go

The song of me rising from bed
is slow, deliberate, full
of thoughts and plans, an ache
or two, the remnants of a dream
elbowed aside like a twisted sheet.

There I am in the mirror, the woman,
the window, the tissue, the mint.
The day begins a song of its own.
Needlepoint wall pansies insist
I am closer to God in my garden
and meeting the sun. Here I am
bubble-headed, bare, slick and
round to the touch everywhere.

My song rises in the steam
of my own breath, in mist,
in moisture, absorbed in terrycloth,
patted, dried and puffed. I breathe
the fragrance myself and know it
and like it. My song sings the day
ahead. There I go again.

Maryann Hazen-Stearns © 2000

Love's Distillate

We met and almost passed
either side of the road.
Sights locked diagonally
yards before;
and as lines drew parallel, attraction peaked;
old school memories spluttered to the surface.
As paths crossed and distance stretched,
the pull not reduced, spun us face to face.
Ignoring traffic, blaring horns and fingered salutes,
we kissed on cheeks, then lips and hips gridlocked.

In days soon spent, in those hours we slept,
the seconds I blinked, I kept your scent with me.
In its cloudy vapours your face, every nuance captured.
Your essence lingers still, on each downy hair that stirred
at the faintest tremor of your stiletto heels in the hall.
Perfume trapped between the weft and weave of shirts
once borrowed, that now so limply tell our tale.

That last night we dined in Grasse,
blending fragrances from the past.
You wore a white muslin dress that wrapped you close
like the boy king's eternal bandages.
I envied the way it bound your breasts,
in teasing contours and heightened shades.
Along winding tracks and over swelling mound,
down moist warm valley sharply cut.
Thighs tethered close, tight buttocks lever
side to side to maintain momentum.

The gauzy fibre netted your soaped and scented body,
perfumed oil whirled around your limbs.
We danced, we laughed, we loved.
Next morning the dress remained cold and mute;
you were gone but for your perfumed remains.
Months later, when I brush against the dusty chiffon
I smell you close, you rise on the vapour,distil and form in the dancing motes.
The spectre of faded Civet hangs in the powdered air,
it goads my senses with its sharp retort.

Narcotic narcissus spins me in delirium,
the distillation has intoxicated me.
The Ambergris drifts on the sea, and I must follow.

Joe Warner © 2000

         observing   a spear of summer grass
           I conjure   other blades

an acrid stench   from the silage clamp
        the smoke   of my own breath

John Carley © 2000